The Well-Tempered Ear

Starting TODAY, the First Unitarian Society of Madison offers three free, online mini-concerts at noon on Fridays to celebrate Women’s History Month

March 12, 2021
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By Jacob Stockinger

The Ear has received the following announcement to post about three free, online mini-concerts to celebrate Women’s History Month through the Friday Noon Musicales at the First Unitarian Society of Madison.

The concerts start today:

UPCOMING PERFORMANCES

•   To celebrate Women’s History Month, the First Unitarian Society of Madison will present three Friday Noon Musicales during March. 

•   All three will be guest produced by Iva Ugrcic. 

•   Iva Ugrcic (below) is Founding Artistic Director of the Madison-based LunART Festival, which supports, inspires, promotes and celebrates women in the arts.  

•   Each program will feature highlights from past LunART Festival performances.

•   Each program will be approximately 45 minutes long.

DATES AND PROGRAMS

Each video will become available at noon on the indicated date, and will remain available for viewing in perpetuity.

This Friday, March 12 — Works by living composers Jocelyn Hagen, Salina Fisher and Missy Mazzoli (below top), as well as Romantic-era composer Clara Schumann (below bottom, Getty Images).  Specific titles are not named.

Performers include: Iva Ugrcic, flute; Matthew Onstad, trumpet; Tom Macaluso, trombone; Elena Ross and Todd Hammes, percussion; Kyle Johnson, Jason Kutz, Satoko Hayami and Yana Avedyan, piano; Beth Larson and Isabella Lippi, violin; Karl Lavine, cello (below); ARTemis Ensemble.

Friday, March 19 — Works by living composers Linda Kachelmeier, Elsa M’bala, Doina Rotaru (below top) and Eunike Tanzil, as well as Medieval mystic Hildegard von Bingen (below bottom) and Romantic-era Fanny Mendelssohn-Hensel. Specific works are not named. (In the YouTube video at the bottom, you can hear flutist Iva Ugrcic play Doina Rotaru’s haunting “Japanese Garden.”)

Performers include: Iva Ugrcic, flute; Jose Ignacio Santos Aquino, clarinet; Midori Samson, bassoon; Breta Saganski and Dave Alcorn, percussion; Satoko Hayami (below), Jason Kutz and Eunike Tanzil, piano; ARTemis Ensemble

Friday, March 26 — Alexandra Olsavsky, Edna Alejandra Longoria, Kate Soper and Jenni Brandon as well as post-Romantic era American composer Amy Beach (below bottom). Specific pieces are not named. 

Performers include: ARTemis Ensemble; a string quartet with violinists Isabella Lippi and Laura Burns, violist Fabio Saggin, and cellist Mark Bridges (below); Jeff Takaki, bass; Vincent Fuh and Kyle Johnson, piano; Jennifer Lien, soprano; Iva Ugrcic, flute.

THREE OPTIONS FOR ATTENDING

•   Website — https://www.fusmadison.org/musicales

•   Facebook — https://www.facebook.com/fusmadison

•   YouTube — https://www.youtube.com/fusmadison > “Playlists” > “Music at FUS”

ABOUT THE “FRIDAY NOON MUSICALES” RECITAL SERIES

•   The Friday Noon Musicales at First Unitarian Society is a free noon-hour recital series offered as a gift to the community. 

•   Founded in 1971, 2020-2021 is the series’ 50th season. 

•   The series has featured some of the finest musicians in the Midwest, who flock to perform in the Frank Lloyd Wright-designed Landmark Auditorium.

•   The music performed is mostly classical, but folk, jazz and musical theater styles are presented on occasion.

•   During the pandemic, the Musicales have largely been on hiatus.

JUSTICE AND MUSIC INITIATIVE (JAM)

•   The Justice And Music Initiative (JAM) at the First Unitarian Society of Madison represents a commitment to more socially equitable and earth-friendly music practices. 

•   This commitment includes music performed on our campus, both for worship and non-worship events. 

•   To help achieve our goal, we recognize and celebrate recognition days and months with our musical selections, such as Hispanic Heritage Month (9/15–10/15), LGBT History Month (October); Native American Indian Heritage Month (November), Black History Month (February), Women’s History Month (March), and African-American Music Appreciation Month (prev. Black Music Month; June).


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Classical music: The Mosaic Chamber Players open their new four-concert season this Saturday night with an all-Mozart program

October 10, 2019
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By Jacob Stockinger

The critically acclaimed Mosaic Chamber Players (below, in a photo by John W. Barker) will open their new season this coming Saturday night, Oct. 12, at 7:30 p.m. in the older and historic Frank Lloyd Wright-designed Landmark Auditorium of the First Unitarian Society of Madison, 900 University Bay Drive.

The program is all works by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (below) and includes the following pieces:

The Sonata for Violin and Piano in C Major, K. 303, features violinist Laura Burns, of the Madison Symphony Orchestra and the Oakwood Chamber Players,  and pianist Jess Salek, who is also the founder and artistic director of the chamber music ensemble.

The Sonata for Violin and Piano in B-Flat Major K. 454, will be performed by violinist Wes Luke, of the Ancora String Quartet and the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra, and pianist Salek.

The energetic Piano Quartet in G minor, K. 478, features violinist Laura Burns, violist Wes Luke, pianist Salek and cellist Derek Handley (below), of the Madison Symphony Orchestra, the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra and the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra. (In the YouTube video at the bottom, you can see a graphic depiction of the first movement of the Piano Quartet.)

Tickets are $15 for general admission, $10 for seniors, and $5 for students. Only checks or cash will be accepted.

A reception will be held after the performance

Here are the concerts and programs – all take place at the First Unitarian Society — for the rest of four-concert season, including two-all Beethoven concerts to mark the Beethoven Year in which the 250th anniversary of the composer’s birth will be celebrated.

Friday, Feb. 21, at noon (Free admission)

All-Beethoven (below) String Sonata Program:

Sonata in F Major for Piano and Cello, Op. 5, No. 1

Sonata in E-Flat Major for Piano and Violin, Op. 12, No. 3

Sonata in C minor for Piano and Violin, Op. 30, No. 2

Saturday March 21, at 7:30 p.m. (Tickets required)

All-Prokofiev (below) Program:

Sonata in F minor for Violin and Piano, Op. 80

Sonata in D Major for Violin and Piano, Op. 94a

Sonata in C Major for Cello and Piano, Op. 119

Saturday June 13, 2020 7:30 p.m. (Tickets required)

All-Beethoven Piano Trio Program:

Piano Trio in E-Flat Major, Op. 1, No. 1

Piano Trio in E-Flat Major, Op. 70, No. 2

Piano Trio in G Major, Op. 121a: “Kakadu” Variations

For more information about the group and biographies of the players, go to: http://www.mosaicchamberplayers.com

You can also follow the group on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mosaicchamberplayers/


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Classical music: The Token Creek Chamber Music Festival starts this Friday and marks 30 years with jazz plus music by Bach, Mozart, Liszt, Brahms, Ravel, Schoenberg and John Harbison

August 13, 2019
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By Jacob Stockinger

Starting this coming Friday, Aug. 16, and running through Sept. 1, the Token Creek Chamber Music Festival will mark its 30th anniversary with the theme of “Sanctuary.” (The festival takes place in a refurbished barn, below, at 4037 Highway 19 in DeForest.)


Add the festival directors: “The term ‘sanctuary’ attempts to capture in a single word something essential about what the festival has meant to players and listeners over all these years. From the start it aspired to offer something of retreat, an oasis, a place of refreshment and nourishment in art, both for musician participants who find a welcoming environment to “re-charge” their work, and for audience attendees who engage in and become a part of it.”

“In our small country barn,” writes prize-winning composer John Harbison (below top, in a photo by Tom Artin) who co-directs the festival with his violinist wife Rose Mary Harbison (below bottom, in a photo by Tom Artin), “we have always remained devoted to the scale and address of much chamber music, which speaks as often in a whisper as in a shout.

“Where larger musical institutions have been habitually frustrated by trying to live in the business model of growth, we have remained devoted to the intensity of the experience, which explains why the music never goes away, rather than to claims of numbers, which begs the music itself to change its very nature.

“Our conviction is that today’s composers, just like Schubert and Mozart, are still striving to embody daily experience, to connect to the natural world, and to ask philosophically and spiritually unanswerable questions, surrounded and interrupting silence, asking only for our most precious commodity — time. We continue to look for valuable ways to offer this transaction to our listeners, and are grateful for their interest over so many years.”

The first two concerts, at 5 p.m., on Friday and Saturday nights, feature the return of a jazz cabaret featuring standard works in the Great American Songbook. For more information about the program and performers, as well as tickets, go to: www.tokencreekfestival.org or call (608) 241-2525.

Tickets for the two jazz concerts are $40 for the balcony and $45 for cafe seating. Tickets for the other concerts are $32 with a limited number of student tickets available for $12.

HERE IS THE LINEUP FOR THE REST OF THE FESTIVAL

Program 2: Music of Brahms at 4 p.m. on Saturday, Aug. 24, and Sunday, Aug. 25

Johannes Brahms is the only composer whose complete catalogue of chamber music is still in constant use.  This is due to his fastidious high standards, and to his ideal temperament for music played by smaller groups of players. His music is universally admired for the astounding combination of sheer craft and deep emotional impact.

The program includes the Regenlied (Rain Song), Op. 57 no. 3; Sonata for Violin and Piano in G major, Op. 78; the Sonata for Cello and Piano in E minor, Op. 38; and the Piano Quartet in C minor, Op. 60. (The “Rain Song” is used as the theme of the last movement of the violin sonata. You can hear it performed by violinist Leonidas Kavakos and pianist Yuja Wang in the YouTube video at the bottom, which also features the score so that you can follow along.)

Performers are Edgewood College mezzo-soprano Kathleen Otterson (below top); violinist Rose Mary Harbison; violist Lila Brown (below second); cellist Rhonda Rider (below third, in a photo by Liz Linder); and pianist Janice Weber (below bottom).

Program 3: Then and Now, Words and Music – An 80th Birthday Tribute to John Harbison. Wednesday, Aug. 28, at 7:30 p.m.

Last February, when Madison launched a citywide celebration of co-artistic director John Harbison’s 80th birthday, bitter cold and deep snow made it impossible for the festival to open up The Barn and join in the festivities.

The Wednesday program – an intimate concert of words and music curated by the Harbisons — is the festival’s belated birthday tribute. Harbison will read from his new book about Johann Sebastian Bach, and Boston poet Lloyd Schwartz (below top) will offer a reading of his poems that are the basis of a song cycle to presented by baritone Simon Barrad (below bottom). The evening will include a discussion on setting text, “Poem to Song,” and the world premiere of new Harbison songs, still in progress, on poems of Gary Snyder.

The program includes: Selections from the Violin Sonata in B minor, with violinist Rose Mary Harbison, and “The Art of Fugue” by Johann Sebastian Bach; “Four Songs of Solitude” and “Nocturne” by John Harbison; the Violin Sonata in G Major by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart; the “Phantasy” for violin and piano by Arnold Schoenberg; the “SchwartzSongs” and “Four Poems for Robin” by John Harbison.

Program 4: The Piano , at 4 p.m. on Sunday, Aug. 31, and Sunday, Sept. 1.

The closing program welcomes back husband-and-wife pianists Robert Levin and Ya-Fei Chuang, playing together and as soloists.

Chuang (below top) is acclaimed by critics in the U.S. and abroad for performances of stunning virtuosity, refinement and communicative power. Levin (below bottom, in a photo by Clive Barda), who teaches at Harvard University, is revered for his Mozart completions and classical period improvisations.

Their program explores the question of the composer-performer — that is, composers who were also formidable pianists: Mozart, Ravel and Liszt.

Beethoven’s fourth piano concerto, arranged by the composer for chamber ensemble, and excerpts of Harbison’s Piano Sonata No. 2, written for Levin, will be performed. Also on the program are Mozart’s Allegro in G Major, K. 357 (completion by Robert Levin); Maurice Ravel’s “Gaspard de la Nuit”; and Franz Liszt’s “Reminiscences of Don Juan.”

Other performers are: violinists Rose Mary Harbison and Laura Burns, of the Madison Symphony Orchestra and Rhapsodie String Quartet; violists Jen Paulson and Kaleigh Acord; cellist Karl Lavine, who is principal cello of both the  Madison Symphony Orchestra and the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra as well as the Chamber Music Director of the Wisconsin Youth Symphony Orchestras (WYSO); and double bassist Ross Gilliland.


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Classical music: The Madison-based string quartet Quartessence will perform this Sunday afternoon at the Little Brown Church in Richland County

August 2, 2019
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By Jacob Stockinger

On this Sunday, Aug. 4, at 2 p.m. the Madison-based Quartessence string quartet (below, in a photo by Ralph Russo) will perform a rare public concert of classical music at the Little Brown Church in Richland County. (The group usually performs at private events.)

Performers (below, from left) are: violinist Suzanne Beia; cellist Sarah Schaffer; violinist Laura Burns; and violist Jennifer Clare Paulson. Beia, Burns and Paulson are members of the Madison Symphony Orchestra, the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra and the Pro Arte String Quartet. Schaffer has a career in arts management and organizes the annual summertime Token Creek Chamber Music Festival.

The location is 29864 Brown Church Road at the intersection of Highway 130 and Highway B, approximately five miles north of Highway 14.

Tickets cost $10 for adults and $5 for students, and will be available at the door.

The program includes: music by baroque composer Antonio Vivaldi; the “Brook Green” Suite by Gustav Holst; the String Quartet in G Major, K. 156, by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart; “Household Music: Three Preludes on Welsh Hymn Tunes” by British composer Ralph Vaughan Williams (originally written for organ, one of the preludes can be heard in an orchestral arrangement in the YouTube video at the bottom); and “Painting the Floors Blue” and “Thanks, Victor” by the contemporary American composer John Harbison.

The concert is sponsored by a family, and proceeds will be used by the Friends of the Little Brown Church for maintenance of the building. The donors are happy to be able to provide this opportunity to music lovers in the community.

The refurbished building is air-conditioned, so you can take a break from the hot weather while you enjoy the music.

Here is some background from Harriet Statz (below, far right), who organizes the event because the Little Brown Church is special to her:

“Last year we started what is turning out to be an annual event (maybe) at the Brown Church (below) in Richland County. That’s up the road (Highway 131) from where I lived in the late 1970s.

“Since then Julie Jazicek and I have been in contact about fencing for this historic place, as she is sort of the manager and deserves much credit for keeping both the building and grounds beautiful. Over the years some concerts have been held in the church, but until 2018 nothing classical. So we fixed that!

“Last year’s concert by the Quartessence Quartet was a resounding success. An audience of about 60 people encouraged us to keep going, so we did, and hope for even a larger turnout to fill up the place. As it turns out the acoustics are outstanding!

“The location is west of Spring Green and north of Lone Rock. It’s a lovely drive. So I invite you to mark this Sunday Aug. 4, on your calendar and come out to the country for a lovely afternoon of music. Bring friends! Share rides!”

For information, call 608-356-8421 or send an email to: FriendsOfLittleBrownChurch@gmail.com


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Classical music: The Mosaic Chamber Players perform all 20th-century American music this Saturday night. Plus, a master class about Schubert is TODAY at 4:30

January 24, 2019
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ALERT: Susan Youens, a world-famous scholar of the music of Franz Schubert, will give a FREE and PUBLIC master class TODAY at 4:30 p.m. in Morphy Recital Hall. Her class is in advance of her appearance and pre-concert lecture at the annual UW Schubertiade this Sunday afternoon, Jan. 27. More information about that event will appear in tomorrow’s blog post. 

By Jacob Stockinger

The critically acclaimed Mosaic Chamber Players will perform a concert of all-American music from the 20th century this Saturday night, Jan. 26, at 7:30 p.m. in the Frank Lloyd Wright-designed  Landmark Auditorium of the First Unitarian Society of Madison, 900 University Bay Drive.

Tickets are $15 for adults; $10 for senior citizens; and $5 for students. Only cash and personal checks will be accepted.

A reception will follow the concert.

Performers are violinists Laura Burns and Wes Luke, cellist Kyle Price, and founder-pianist Jess Salek. (Photos below of the performers are by John W. Barker at a previous concert.) They also play with other professional groups such as the Madison Symphony Orchestra, the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra, the Ancora String Quartet and the Rhapsodie String Quartet.

The program includes the Sonata for Violin and Piano by Aaron Copland; the Sonata in Three Movements for Violin and Piano by Ellen Taaffe Zwilich (below); “Road Movies” for Violin and Piano by John Adams (you can hear the opening in the YouTube video at the bottom); and the Sonata for Cello and Piano, Op. 6, by Samuel Barber.


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Classical music: The Mosaic Chamber Players perform an all-Schubert concert on Saturday night. On Sunday afternoon, Opera Props presents singers in a benefit concert to support the opera program at the UW-Madison

September 13, 2018
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ALERT: On this Sunday afternoon at 3 p.m., in the Madison Christian Community Church at 7118 Old Sauk Road on Madison’s far west side, Opera Props will present a benefit concert to raise money for the UW-Madison’s opera program and University Opera.

Student singers and piano accompanist Daniel Fung will perform arias and songs. But the spotlight will shine on University of Wisconsin-Madison alumna soprano Julia Rottmayer, who is a new faculty member at the UW-Madison’s Mead Witter School of Music. (Sorry, no specific program is given and no names of composers and works are mentioned.)

Tickets are $30 in advance, $35 at the door with student tickets costing $10. Tickets include a reception with local Gail Ambrosius chocolate, fruit, cheese and wine. For more information, go to: https://www.uwoperaprops.org

By Jacob Stockinger

Why is The Ear increasingly drawn to the music of Franz Schubert (below) over, say, the music of his contemporary and idol Ludwig van Beethoven? It seems to be more than its sheer beauty and lyricism.  It also seems to possess a certain warmth or human quality that he finds irresistible, poignant and restorative, especially if it is true, as the Buddha said, life is suffering.

In any case, The Ear is not alone.

The Madison-based Mosaic Chamber Players (below, in a photo by John W. Barker) will open their new and ambitious season this coming Saturday night with a concert of music by Franz Schubert.

The all-Schubert concert is at 7:30 p.m. in the  chapel of the First Congregational United Church of Christ, 1609 University Avenue, near Camp Randall Stadium — NOT at the First Unitarian Society of Madison, as was incorrectly stated earlier in this blog post.

The program includes two Sonatinas for Violin and Piano in D Major, D. 384, and A minor, D. 385; the famous “Arpeggione” Sonata, D. 821, performed on the cello with piano; and the lovely and songful Adagio or “Notturno” (Nocturne) for Piano Trio, D. 897, which you can hear with violinist Anne-Sophie Mutter and pianist Daniil Trifonov, in the YouTube video at the bottom.

Tickets cost $15 for adults; $10 for seniors; and $5 for students. Cash and checks only will be accepted; no credit cards.

Members of the Mosaic Chamber Players are: founder and pianist Jess Salek (below top); violinist Wes Luke (below second), who plays with the Ancora String Quartet and Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra; violinist Laura Burns (below third), who also plays with the Madison Symphony Orchestra and the MSO’s Rhapsodie String Quartet; and cellist Kyle Price (below bottom), who founded the Caroga Lake Music Festival in New York State and is pursuing his doctoral degree at the UW-Madison’s Mead Witter School of Music with distinction and who was a member of the graduate student Hunt Quartet while he studied for his master’s.

A reception will follow the concert.

For more information about the Mosaic Chamber Players and about their new season, which includes some very varied composers but no specific titles of works, go to: http://www.mosaicchamberplayers.com

What do you find so appealing and so special about the music of Schubert?

What is your favorite Schubert work?

Leave your thoughts in the COMMENT section with a link, if possible, to a YouTube video performance.

The Ear wants to hear.


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Classical music: The Mosaic Chamber Players complete their cycle of Beethoven sonatas for strings with impressive beauty and sensitivity

October 10, 2017
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By Jacob Stockinger

Here is a special posting, a review written by frequent guest critic and writer for this blog, John W. Barker. Barker (below) is an emeritus professor of Medieval history at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He also is a well-known classical music critic who writes for Isthmus and the American Record Guide, and who hosts an early music show once a month on Sunday morning on WORT-FM 89.9 FM. For years, he served on the Board of Advisors for the Madison Early Music Festival and frequently gives pre-concert lectures in Madison. Barker also took the performance photos.

By John W. Barker

In another distressingly overcrowded weekend, hard choices had to be made about which event to attend. I picked the performance by the Mosaic Chamber Players last Saturday night at the Frank Lloyd Wright-designed Landmark Auditorium of the First Unitarian Society of Madison.

For the past four years, this group has pursued a “complete” survey of Beethoven’s sonatas for strings and piano. Since he composed 10 for violin and piano plus five for cello and piano, it was easy to organize them into five concerts, each with two violin sonatas and one for cello. In addition, it was possible in many programs to draw on all three periods of Beethoven’s output.

This year’s concert was thus the fifth and the last in the series, climaxing a really impressive achievement for artistic director and guiding spirit Jess Salek and his colleagues.

As pianist in all three of the works presented, Salek (below) provided more than accompaniment, since the role of the piano was generally put on terms of equal partnership, sometimes even of relative superiority. He played bravely, justly showing palpable pride in the total achievement.

Laura Burns (below), who also plays with the Madison Symphony Orchestra and the MSO’s Rhapsodie String Quartet, was the violinist in the early Sonata No. 2 in A major, Op. 12, No. 2.

This happens to be the first of these Beethoven sonatas that I came to know and love in my youth, via an old Jascha Heifetz recording, so it had particular reverberations for me. To its wit and sprightliness Burns brought an added warmth of sound and spirit.

The Cello Sonata No. 5 in D, Op. 102, No. 2, was the last one Beethoven composed for this medium, and one of two that dates from the composer’s late period. A great deal of very serious thinking went into it, with a slow movement particularly notable for its spiritual depth. Cellist Kyle Price (below) delivered it with genuine feeling and with great strength of tone.

Also Beethoven’s last work for its medium, the Violin Sonata No. 10 in G, Op. 96, comes from late in the composer’s so-called middle period. It is a work of almost kaleidoscopic variety, with frequent changes of mood and character.

Its core is another slow movement of amazingly personal eloquence and breath-taking beauty. And the theme-and-variations movement finale seems to have everything (almost) in it but the kitchen sink. (You can hear Wes Luke and Jess Salek performing another theme-and-variations movement from a different Beethoven violin sonata in the cycle, Op. 30, No. 1, in the YouTube video at the bottom.)

It was clear that violinist Wes Luke (below), who is also the first violinist of the Ancora String Quartet, was having a whale of a good time playing it, relishing almost every note.

Luke’s printed program notes were particularly excellent, and included notice that the group’s spring concert will juxtapose piano trios of Beethoven and Brahms.

The Mosaic Chamber Players do not receive a great deal of publicity, but their concerts offer some of the most lovely and thought-provoking chamber music repertoire to be found, even in a town so full of wonderful music-making as ours.


Classical music: The “Grace Presents” music series names UW-Madison graduate student Kelly Hiser at its new program coordinator.

July 12, 2013
1 Comment

By Jacob Stockinger

Madison certainly has its share of free, high quality classical musical events.

But among those programs not associated with larger institutions, such as the University of Wisconsin-Madison or the Madison Symphony Orchestra, “Grace Presents” has proven especially reliable and successful.

I think back with fondness to the concerts I attended last season where I heard Brahms violin sonatas (below) with violinist Laura Burns and pianist Jess Salek; various songs by Faure, Hahn and Verdi, including Brahms’ “Liebeslieder Waltzes” (in a YouTube video at bottom); and a solo piano recital by Yana Groves of Debussy, Rachmaninov and Schubert.

Laura Burns Jess Salek Brahms Grace Epis

“Grace Presents,” now in its third season of concerts held in Grace Episcopal Church (below top) on the Capitol Square in downtown Madison, has announced that Kelly Hiser (below bottom) became its new Program Coordinator as of July 1.

grace episcopal church ext

Kelly Hiser

Hiser is a doctoral candidate in musicology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, with a special interest in the history of the spacey-sounding theremin, one of the first forms of electronic instruments, famously used in the slow movement of Aram Khachaturian’s popular Piano Concerto. She is currently serving as Project Assistant to Professor Susan Cook, the recently named Director of the School of Music.

“Grace Presents” offers free concerts by performers in a wide variety of musical styles, including classical, jazz, world and folk, in an outstanding acoustical venue that is resonant for the ears and for the eyes also features beautiful stained glass windows and lovely sculpted wood.

MBM Grace stained glass window

MBM Grace altar

Bruce Croushore, the founder and chair of Grace Presents, noted that the music series is fortunate to have Hiser in charge of lining up interesting talent for future concerts.

“Kelly brings to Grace Presents an impressive skill set, an extensive knowledge of many musical genres and a wide range of connections to the Madison music scene,” Croushore noted. “She will keep Grace Presents in the minds and hearts of lovers of diverse musical styles, performed in Grace Church’s beautiful and acoustically superb space,” he continued.

The monthly hour-long concerts are typically held at noon on Saturdays to encourage shoppers, workers, and downtown residents and visitors to enjoy fine music in a peaceful setting.

Grace Presents sign

The Fall lineup will be announced in August, and The Ear as been told that Hiser will be setting up a website of its own for “Grace Presents.”

In the meantime, here is a link to the Grace Episcopal Church’s website where you can often find news about “Grace Presents” artists and programs:

http://www.graceec.org


Classical music: “Grace Presents” announces and begins its spring series of FREE classical music concerts at noon this Saturday with Sound Ensemble Wisconsin.

January 24, 2013
4 Comments

By Jacob Stockinger

Madison is lucky indeed to have quite a few organizations and presenters that seek to present live classical music in non-traditional venues, and often do so for free. Groups like New MUSE (New Music Everywhere), Classical Revolution and Sound Health (an outreach group to hospitals run out of the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music) come immediately to mind.

Grace Episcopal Church (below is a photo of its exterior with the state Capitol in the background to the right) belongs in that group that seeks to bring great music to the people. It has its own special series, which has just announced the spring schedule that will start on this coming Saturday at noon.

grace episcopal church ext

All concerts for “Grace Presents” on SATURDAYS AT NOON — especially nice when the Dane County Farmers Market starts up in April — and are FREE and open to the public. All concerts are held at Grace Episcopal Church (below is the attractive and acoustically fine interior) the on Capitol Square, at 116 West Washington Avenue in Madison.

grace episcopal church inter

Here is the spring 2013 “Grace Presents” Recital Series:

Jan. 26, 2013: Sound Ensemble Wisconsin — Works to be performed include Charles Ives Violin/Piano Sonata No. 3, Morton Gould‘s Rag-Blues-Rag for solo piano, and 6 Gershwin songs for voice and piano. Mary Theodore, violin (below); Vincent Fuh, piano; Rachel Eve Holmes, soprano.

Mary Theodore violin

Feb. 2, 2013: Laura Burns, violin (below, second from left in in a photo by Greg Anderson of the Madison Symphony Orchestra‘s Rhapsodie String Quartet) and Jess Salek, piano, perform Johannes Brahms’ three violin sonatas (more details concerning programming will be sent at a later date)

Rhapsodie Quartet MSO Greg Anderson

 March 2, 2013: Rachel Eve Holmes, soprano, Kathy Otterson, mezzo-soprano, Jesse Hoffmeister, tenor and John Bohman, baritone perform an Art Song Recital and the Brahms “Liebeslieder” Waltzes with pianists Kirstin Ihde and Michael Roemer.

rachel holmes

April 13, 2013: Black Marigold, a new Madison-based, female woodwind quintet, performs various repertoire (TBA, to be announced)

Black Marigold 2

May 18, 2013: Yana Groves, Ukrainian pianist, performs Bach’s French Suite #3 in B minor BWV 814; Schubert’s Piano Sonata in A minor D. 845, and Debussy’s “Estampes.” (Below is a YouTube video of her rehearsing Mozart’s Piano Concerto in A Major, K. 488, for her senior recital.)


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